Dear Jenny:

Here are a few quotes from your thread, in order quoted: “Was I a bad girlfriend and did I ill-treat him? Was I the wrong, abusive.. one? Will he be better-off without me?… The self-doubt I have is really bad Anita… It exists in every sphere of my life…. I remember feeling the same when mom compared me to family friends, correlated me to a cousin… criticized my  nature”-

– this is all it takes for a girl to criticize her own nature: to be criticized by her own mother. The self doubt starts with: am-I-a-bad-daughter? Am-I-ill-treating-my-mother? Am-I-the-wrong, abusive-one? Will she (your mother) be better-off without me?

All it takes for a girl to be tormented with self-doubt is for her mother to criticize her daughter’s nature. This is all it takes, because for a girl, her mother is a god: what the mother says is the absolute truth, and if her mother criticizes the nature of her adoring, worshipping daughter, then.. that nature of daughter must be wrong and abusive.

Your parents’ marriage- that alleged fairytale marriage- is not the issue. The issue is your mother criticizing you early on, giving birth to your excruciating self-doubt.

“Was I a bad girlfriend and did I ill-treat him? Was I the wrong, abusive.. one?”- I have a definite answer (an answer with no gray area) to the question: was I a bad daughter and did I ill-treat my mother?

Answer: no, you were a good daughter, a very good daughter. You never ill-treated your mother. As to that ex-boyfriend:

You were a bad girlfriend to a bad boyfriend. But.. there is no such thing as being a good girlfriend to a  bad boyfriend: a submissive girlfriend who keeps her head bowed and her eyes to the ground, pleasing the abusive boyfriend any which way.. is a sick girlfriend, not a good girlfriend.

In other words, with an abusive boyfriend, being a good girlfriend is an impossibility. Being a good, healthy person means that you do not have or keep a bad boyfriend in your life.

anita